African king aims to bankrupt Britain

By Adrian Blomfield in Hoima

12:08AM GMT 13 Mar 2004

A half forgotten colonial expedition to subjugate a querulous African kingdom more than a century ago could bankrupt Britain if a Ugandan king succeeds in bringing a £3.7 trillion suit against the Crown.

Solomon I, omukama or king of the Bunyoro kingdom in western Uganda, has never forgiven the British for deposing his grandfather, Kabalega II, and stealing his cattle during a five-year war in the 1890s.

Dressed in his blue velvet coronation robes, richly embroidered in white and gold, the king peered down from one of his thrones yesterday and condemned the "colonial terrorism" of Queen Victoria's government.

"The British burned down houses, destroyed crops and introduced syphilis to my people," he said.

"They were responsible for the deaths of 2.4 million people. Moreover they stole my grandfather's cattle and ivory.

"It is not what we expected from civilised people. What they did then is no different to what al-Qa'eda is doing today."

The king and his courtiers have retained lawyers in both Britain and Uganda and say they are planning to begin proceedings, possibly in London, within the next few weeks.

The £3.7 trillion figure was arrived at by the king's private secretary, Yolamu Nsamba, who read economics at the University of Hull. Britain's annual gross domestic product runs at about £1 trillion.

Were the Bunyoro kingdom to win the amount it is claiming it would be the equivalent of every Briton paying out more than £60,000.

The British Government would be forced to nationalise private companies and the economy of the western world would probably be plunged into depression. But Bunyoro's 800,000 subjects would each receive £4.63 million.

However, Mr Nsamba says the figure reflects only the costs of an initial suit based on possessions looted from Kabalega himself.

"This money is for the cattle, food, ivory and salt stocks that were taken from the royal household," he said. "It does not take into account the land that was stolen from the people or for all the people who were killed.

"We will look at that later - but it could be 10 times that amount."

Another courtier, Ernest Kizza, speaker of the Bunyoro parliament, appeared shocked that a multi-trillion-pound payout would have such a detrimental effect on the British economy.

"I am sure they can afford it," he said. "I think they spent that much in Iraq. But it is their problem. If the British had not destroyed our kingdom, today we would be a superpower. We would be telling America to shut up."

The evidence for the case rests largely on contemporary military field notes, diaries and dispatches by colonial officers in Uganda at the time.

Some letters clearly suggest that the British were responsible for plundering the kingdom, which once had a vast population of elephants.

Captain A B Thurston, who was involved in the campaign to oust Kabalega, described his work, in a letter that will be used as an exhibit, as "mere assassination".

"[I was] a captain of Bashi Bazouks, a raider and an ivory thief," he wrote. "I was sick of the raids and the bloodshed."

King Solomon will also rely on oral evidence to show that the plunder, especially of cattle, led to widespread starvation and misery.

Some of the most common names given to children born during the war, according to Mr Nzamba, included Gafausa (Waste of time), Alifaijo (He will die tomorrow) and Ndoleriire (We are waiting for this child to die also).

But neither Bunyoro's history books nor the case documents show Kabalega, a hero in Uganda for standing up to the British Empire, in a flattering light either.

He massacred thousands of Bugandans living in his kingdom after he fell out with their king, whose territory borders Bunyoro. A British field report records an instance in which he killed 300 of his own followers after becoming suspicious of them.

He was also responsible for atrocities against civilian populations both within Bunyoro and in neighbouring kingdoms.

His warlike behaviour could perhaps be explained by some of Bunyoro's regal traditions. Hundreds of the most faithful servants would be sacrificed when a new king was crowned so that he could ascend the throne through a pool of blood.

The king would be woken at 3am every morning for a bath before returning to bed until dawn. He was expected to have sex with one of his wives between 11 and 11.30 every morning. As a result of this, Kabalega had at least 130 children who survived into adulthood.

The king won several battlefield victories against the British, but was finally captured in 1899 and exiled to the Seychelles for 24 years.

Fellow prisoners included the equally troublesome kings of the Ghanaian Ashantis and of Bahrain. Kabalega was released in 1923 but died on the journey back, just before he reached the borders of his kingdom.

Milton Obote, the Ugandan dictator, abolished the country's five kingdoms in the 1960s but they were restored by President Yoweri Museveni in 1993, though purely with ceremonial powers.

Many traditions linger, though. As a Telegraph team entered the king's throne room, filled with artifacts apparently dating from 450BC when the first Bunyoro kingdom was established, Mr Nsamba gave warning of a curse that hung over the chamber.

"If you lay with a woman last night you will never be able to function again," he said.

The king was not allowed to enter the room if he had enjoyed carnal relations in the previous nine days. As a result he met the Telegraph in a state room instead.

But otherwise the kingdom is a pale shade of its former self. The modern palace, constructed in the 1960s, is a dilapidated white building with garish purple tiles and the heirlooms of the kingdom lie rusting on the floors of damp rooms.

There is no money for the 10th anniversary celebrations of King Solomon's coronation - something that may have prompted the suit.

Kabalega's tomb itself receives only cursory upkeep. In its cavernous interior, the 84-year-old keeper of the royal burial grounds, Emmanuel Baguma, mourned the days of the great king.

"What Britain did was criminal and we should declare war on them for killing all our goats and cattle until they pay us and make us great again," he said. But the king's compensation claims do not appear to enjoy much support from his subjects.

"This is very wrong," said Aisha Kungozo, 24, a teacher who runs a tiny school for 16 children in the village of Mparo outside Bunyoro's capital, Hoima, where the royal palace is situated.

"The British built schools and houses for us. They gave us medicine. They did more to help us than any omukama ever did."